Shot will never be as cheap or anywhere as close to as cheap as it was in the past. For those who think it will be cheap again are only living in a dream world and it is time for you to speak up ... I want to know who else in is my dream world with me unless each dream world is different?

Yes- lead shot will fall dramatically and I am willing to allow someone to make a nice profit. I will sign a legal contract to purchase three tons of shot on July 1, 2008 for $25 per bag. You do not have to have the shot, only agree to purchase it no later than July 1 and I will buy it for $25 per bag on July 1.

There was a show on Discovery Channel a few nights ago about bullits. According to the people interviewed, the military will not be using lead after 2008. Seems that it is not politically correct to shoot your enemy with lead. They could get lead poisoning. Ain't that a hoot!

When demand for something exceeds the supply, prices go up. Changes in price (up or down) are known as a 'price signal'. Price signals cause changes in behavior.

A reasonably free market always forces supply and demand into equilibrium. As the price of something increases, suppliers of that "something" increase the supply. In the case of lead, lead mines increase production. Similarly, anyone sitting on a supply of unused or salvage lead gets it to market to capitalize on high prices.

Consumers on the other hand reduce consumption when possible, to avoid or defer the higher prices. They may substitute another material in place of of all or part of the lead they use. Or, they reduce the amount of lead used in their product. Or... they may temporarily defer purchases of lead supplies.

I stopped buying lead shot about mid summer 2007. I purchased enough new shells to cover my shooting through the end of calender 2008. Those shells were manufactured with lead that shotshell producers bought prior to the spike in the price of commodity lead. As a result premium shells were still $50 - $55 a flat and Gun Clubs, Estates, etc. were still $40 or less.

Assuming Hoosier Daddy's figures are correct, the market has reached a new equilibrium price for lead that is 27% lower than it was on Sept. 30th. Where lead prices go from here will continue to be a function of the relationship of demand for lead versus the supply of lead. I just hope commodity lead prices moderate to what I consider a reasonable level before I run out of bullets next year.

HM- I think I made an offer on a contract for a product made from base metals; however, your comment is appropriate. My offer was close to the line. If I buy long, and HD buys short, we would both lose money.

I had a conversation with a scrap dealer in San Antonio this week. He was buying lead at 30 cents and selling at between 60 and 70 cents. His main source is batteries. He said he has a new machine to tear them apart and he neutralizes the acid with something like ammonia. I'm too long out of chemistry class to know what the actual reaction is. Someone else here might know. He thought things were headed down. Ron

The price has to drop fast for you so that all of the expensive lead the manufacturers bought is completely through the system and then they will lower their price again to make all of us shooters happy again.

I'm in that dream world too!

Hoping and praying for that to happen but once a company sees that they are selling at a higher cost how often does a price fall off again? They may lower the price some but the days of old are gone. If I were betting I would say $30 a bag is about the lowest we will ever see it again. This is a lot better than Bass Pro this weekend at $62 a bag for 7 1/2. I told the guy good luck selling that.

The Eagle shot I have looked at was softer than I expected, had many irregular shapes as indicated by rolling the shot down a slightly inclined glass plate and the number 8 printed on the bag only described about 65% of the size of the shot in the bag. My opinion is based on only 5 bags or Eagle shot. It is possible that the many other bags I did not examine were all much better than the ones I did examine.

The bags should have been labeled "over 50% of the shot is #8 with a lot of other sizes between 7 and 9 mixed in, and a few shot will measure as #7.5 on one axis and #9 on another axis.

Eagle shot did seem to break targets even with my low confidence in the stuff.

I am not overly surprised when I find such irregular shot in a discount factory shell but I want to reload shot that is a little more uniform. I will state that Eagle shot seems to be a little better than Star shot.